Transmission of Divine Revelation
Christ must be proclaimed to all nations and individuals:
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit, [20] teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.
–Matthew28:19-20
What did the apostles and their successor teach?
- They transmitted the message of Christ brought from the very beginnings of Christianity by means of preaching
witness, institutions, worship and inspired writings.
- The transmission is done in 2 ways: orally and in writings.\
"In order that the full and living Gospel might always be preserved in the Church the apostles left as their successors.
They gave them their own position of teaching authority"
"In order that the full and living Gospel might always be preserved in the Church the apostles left bishops as their
successors. They gave them their own position of teaching authority."
The living transmission, accomplished in the Holy Spirt, is called Tradition. Since it is distinct from Sacred Scripture,
through closely connected. Through Tradition, “the Church, in her doctrine, life and worship, perpetuates and transmits to
every generation all that she herself is, all that she believes”.
“Sacred Scripture” is the speech of God as it is put down in writing under the breath of the Holy Spirit.
Events
The bible speaks of a love story/covenant between God and Israel
- A story happens before it was written
- A story contains characters, events, experiences
Oral Traditions
- God revealed him to people through events and people talked about their experiences
Written Traditions
- Written traditions were based on oral traditions parts of oral tradition were written down for better preservation.
Edited Traditions
- At various times in the history of the chosen people, the inherited oral & written traditions were edited.
Canonical Traditions
- Some of these edited traditions are recognized by the worshipping community as inspired & are accepted as
vehicles of revelation because they faithfully reflect the beliefs & experiences of the community
The Oral Tradition
- For after the ascension of the Lord, the aposties handed on to their hearers what he had said and done, but with
that fuller understanding which they, instructed by the glorious events of Christ and enlightened by the Spint of
truth, now enjoyed.
The Written Gospels
- "The sacred authors, in writing the four Gospels, selected certain of the many elements which had been handed on
either orally or already in written form; others they synthesized or explained With an eye to the Situation of the
churches. while sustaining the form of preaching, but always In such a fashion that they have told us the honest
truth about Jesus.
Many years have passed after Christ’s ascension. During those times, only Holy Tradition serves as the source of faith
among Christians.
The task of giving an authentic interpretation of the Word of God, whether in its written form or in the form of Tradition,
has been entrusted to the living teaching office of the Church alone.
This means that the task of interpretation has been entrusted to the bishops in communion with the successor of Peter, the
Bishop of Rome. Yet this Magisterium is not superior to the Word of God, but is its servant. It teaches only what has been
handed on to it.
The faithful receive with docility the teachings and directives what their pastors give them in different forms.
They are mindful of Christ's words to his apostles:
"Whoever listens to you listens to me. Whoever rejects you rejects me. And whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent
me."(Lk.10:16)
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
The Bible is also called Holy Scriptures or the Book of books. In the New Testament however, when Jesus refers to
Scriptures, He meant the Torah or the First five Books in the Bible:Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and
Deuteronomy.
The Bible contains 73 books: 46 are from the OT and 27 from the New Testament. The books were written in different
historical era and took more than a thousand years before they were finally completed written between 1300 BC- 100 AD.
The Bible is the most translated book. It was printed and translated in 438 language. The new testament has been
translated into 1168 languages and some parts of the Bible can be read in 2454 languages.
The bible is also the most studied book. Each year about 10,000 books and articles about the bible are written by the
scholars.
It is also the most venerated book in solemn masses the bible is venerated by means of candles and incense.
Origin of the Bible
Latin-Biblia means book
Greek- ta biblia means Books.
- The bible is one book but it contains many books
These books were written at different times in different places by different people or communities.
The books were written in many different literary forms and styles
a. history,
b. poetry,
c. prayer
d. laws and regulations
e. prophetic writings
f. narratives,
g. wisdom
The Bible is also called Scripture and the word "Scripture" comes from the
-Latin word "Scriptura" writing something written
What was written down?
- faith experiences and sacred traditions of people.
-
Historical Books 21
- Genesis - Deuteronomy
- Exodus - Nehemiah
- 2 Kings Tobit
- 1 Chronicles - Joshua
- Leviticus - Judges
- 2 Chronicles - Ruth
- Numbers - Judith
- Ezra - Esther
- 1 Samuel
- 2 Samuel
- 1 Kings
- 1 Maccabees
Moral /Wisdom Books (7)
- Job
- Psalms
- Proverbs
- Ecclesiastes
- Song of Songs
- Wisdom
- Ecclesiasticus
Prophetical Books (18)
- Ezekiel - Isaiah
- Daniel - Obadiah
- Hosea - Jeremiah
- Joel - Jonah
- Haggai - Micah
- Zechariah - Lamentations Baruch
- Amos - Nahum
- Malachi - Habakkuk
- Zephaniah
Historical Books (5)
- 4 Evangelists
- Matthew
- Mark
- Luke
- John
- Acts of the Apostles
Moral Books (21)
14 letters of St. Paul 7 Catholic Epistles
- Romans - James
- 1 Corinthians - Peter
- 2 Corinthians - -2 Peter 1 John
- Galatians - 2 John
- Ephesians - 3 John Jude
- Philip
- Colosians
- 1Thessalonian
- 2 Thessalonians
- 1 Timothy
- 2 Timothy
- Titus
- Philemon
- Hebrews
III. Salvation History: The Story the Bible Tells
A. Salvation History and Covenants
The Bible gives us history from God’s perspective. It shows us that all throughout time, God is working to bring us
salvation. That’s why we say that the Bible gives us "salvation history."
This salvation history, in turn, hinges upon the "covenants" that God makes with his people throughout the Bible. The
great early Church Father, Irenaeus, recognized the need for studying salvation history in terms of the covenants:
"Understanding ...consists in showing why there are a number of covenants with mankind and in teaching what is the
character of those covenants" (Against the Heresies, Book I, Chapter 10, no. 3).
What is a covenant?
- Contracts are deals where two parties make a promise that involves some exchange of goods or services or
property. Usually they seal their contract by giving their "word" - their name - in the form of their signature.
- When parties make a covenant, they swear oaths. Oaths are more than promises. Instead of swearing by their own
name, they swear by the highest name, by the name of God.
- "Do you swear to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God?" That’s an oath formula. You
ask for God’s help to tell the truth ("so help me, God") and it’s implied that if you lie, you’re going to be punished
by God.
- Covenants involve, not an exchange of property, but an exchange of persons. You don’t give somebody your
services or goods when you swear a covenant oath - you swear to give them yourself.
- Marriage is a good example. It’s a covenant because in the exchange of vows, the woman gives herself to the man
and the man gives himself to the woman.
- As we will see in the next lesson, when God says to Israel, "You will be my people and I will be your God," that’s
a covenant. What’s happening is that Israel is swearing an oath to God - to live according to God’s law as His
people, His children. In turn, God is swearing to be Israel’s God, its divine parent. There are blessings for keeping
the covenant and curses for breaking it.
- In the ancient world, covenants made families. Even ancient treaty documents between nations used "father-son"
imagery. Outsiders were "adopted" into a tribe through covenant oaths. So, when we study the Bible we need to
see how the meaning of "covenant" is steeped in that ancient idea of family-making.
That’s the "point" of the whole Bible story - how God, through these covenants, reveals more and more of Himself to his
creatures and asks them to enter into a family relationship with Him.
St. Paul sums up God’s intentions, this way: "As God said: ‘I will live with them and move among them, and I will be
their God and they shall be my people.’....‘I will be a Father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to Me,’ says the
Lord Almighty." (see 2 Corinthians 6:16-18).
Throughout the salvation history told in the Bible God acts through His covenants to extend the Family of God. He starts
small with just two people, Adam and Eve, and proceeds - through Noah, Abraham, Moses, David - until finally all
nations are brought into the covenant through Jesus Christ.
The plan from the beginning was to make all men and women into His sons and daughters through the covenants, which
are all summed up in Jesus’ New Covenant, where God sends us "a Spirit of adoption, through which we can cry,
Abba, ‘Father!’"
B. The Old and New Testament
The Bible tells the story of salvation history.
Salvation history is the story of God’s marvelous work, since the creation of the world, to make all men and women His
children, to form from the family of mankind a family of God.
He does this through a series of covenants that He makes with key figures at key points in the Bible.
"Testament" is just another word for "covenant."
And what goes on in the Old Testament is all about preparing the way for and announcing what’s going to happen in the
New Testament. Christ and His cross, is like the "hinge" between the Old and the New Testaments.
All the covenants that God made in the Old Testament find their fulfillment - their full meaning and purpose - in Jesus, in
His "new Covenant."
IV. Starting in the Beginning: An Introduction to Genesis
A. The Story of Creation
Genesis 1:1 tells us that in the beginning the world was "formless and empty." The plot proceeds by showing us how
God sets out to fix this - first, by giving the world form and then filling it.
In Days 1-3, God creates the "form" or the "realms" of the world - the day and the night; the sky and the sea; the land
and the vegetation.
In Days 4-6, God fills these realms with "rulers" or "governors" - the sun, moon & stars (which "rule over the day and
over the night"; verses 14-19); the birds and the fish to fill the sky and the seas; and man and beast, which rule the land.
There’s a perfect order to all this. First God creates the "structure" of the world, then He fills that structure with living
beings. It’s like He’s making a house and then putting inhabitants into it. And the individual days match up, too.
On Day 1, God creates day and night. On Day 4, He creates the "rulers" for the realms of day and night - the sun the
moon and the stars.
On Day 2, He makes the sky and the sea. On Day 5, the sky and the sea are given their "governors," the fish and birds.
On Day 3, the land and the vegetation are created. And on Day 6, animals and the first humans are given dominion, rule
over that land.
After each day of creation, God sees that His work is "good." After the six "work days" are through, God sees that His
work is "very good." The word "very" is used to mark the end of the creation cycle, since God had finished creating the
realms and the rulers.
The word "very" is used to mark the end of the creation cycle, since God had finished creating the realms and the rulers.
B. The Word and the Sabbath
How does God create?
By speaking His Word. He says "Let there be..." and things come into being.
We know by reading the Old Testament in light of the New Testament, that the Word of God by which He created the
world is Jesus (see John 1: 1-3; Colossians 1: 16-17).
That's something to remember God's Word always does things, God's Word does what it says it's doing.
When He says, "Let there be light," His Word creates light, really and truly, God's Word does what it says it's doing,
This same power of the living Word of God is at work in the sacraments of the Church. When the priest speaks the Word
of Jesus: "This is My Body," the bread and wine at the altar become the Body and Blood of Christ. When the priest speaks
the Word of Jesus: "I absolve you" or "I baptize you," that Word creates the reality it speaks about.
One more interesting thing to point out. We may have a hint of the Church’s doctrine of the Trinity in these early verses
of Genesis.
Notice that we have three divine actors here – There is God, there is the Word that He speaks,
and there is the Spirit that’s describe hovering over the face of the deep (seeGenesis 1:2).
Note that the New American Bible translates this "a mighty wind." But it’s more accurately translated in the Revised
Standard Version: "The Spirit of God," which follows the Vulgate, the Church’s official Latin edition ("spiritus Dei) and
the Septuagint, the ancient Greek translation of the Old Testament ("pneuma Theos").
Notice, too, that God appears to be talking to Himself in the plural: "Let Us make man inOur image, after Our likeness"
(Genesis 1:26-27). Why didn’t God say, "Let Me make man in My image, etc."?
it may be our first hint of what Jesus will later reveal - that God is three divine Persons in One: Father, Son and Holy
Spirit (see Matthew 28:19).
On the seventh day, God rests and blesses His creation. Now we’re into the next chapter of Genesis (see Genesis 2:2-3).
It’s not that God got tired. We should see this cosmic rest and blessing as the first of the cycle of covenants that we will
see throughout the Bible.
God, by His act of establishing the Sabbath, is making a covenant with His creation, and especially with all of humanity,
represented by the man He created in His own image. That seems to be what Jesus is getting at when He says: "The
Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mark 2:27-28).
God doesn’t create the world for no reason - to be detached or somehow unrelated to Him. He creates the world, and the
human family out of love. The Sabbath is the sign of that covenant and that love.
God explains this later when He gives Moses the Sabbath laws for the people of Israel. He says the Sabbath is "a perpetual
covenant" (see Exodus 31:16-17). That’s why the Catechism calls the creation story the "first step" in God’s covenant-
making and "the first and universal witness to God’s all-powerful love" (no. 288).
Also, the Hebrew word for "oath-swearing" is sheba, a word that’s based on the Hebrew word for the number "seven." In
Hebrew, to swear an oath, which is what you do when you make a covenant, is "to seven oneself" (see Abraham’s oath
in Genesis 21:27-32).
So, what God seems to be doing here on the seventh day, is not resting, but binding Himself to His creation in a perpetual
covenant relationship. And we’ll see this pattern of covenant continuing throughout the Bible.
God's Word in human words.
The written words in Scripture are God's words through the words of human authors. He chose to show and communicate
himself and his will that all people may come to salvation. God communicates in Scripture through tangible signs and
images, parables, allegory, poetry, etc.
Divine inspiration was the directing influence and guidance of the Holy Spirit under which the sacred writers wrote all
that God want thern to write and Ohly what God wanted them to write (DV 11. CFC 85)
Proofs from the Sacred Scriptures
"No prophetic message ever came just from the will of the people but they were carried by the holy Spirit as they spoke
the message that came from God." (2Pet 1:21)
"The Scriptures makes us hear the voice of the Holy Spirit in the words of the prophets and the apostles."
Being divinely inspired, Scripture enjoys inerrancy.
This means that Scripture teaches firmly, faithfully and without error that truth which God wants for the sake of the
salvation of all.
Old and New Testament
The Bible is composed of two parts called:
1. The Old Testament or the First Testament
2. New Testament or the Second Testament
The revelation of God's love in Israel's history was but a foreshadowing of the fullness of the revelation of that love in
Christ
At the same time, the Son and the Word of God is, in his person and in everything he said and did, the wholehearted
response to God's love
In a sense, He is both as revelation and as answer to the revelation
The Old Testament (God's Covenant with Israel)
God showed his love in many ways:
- in the events of Israel's history
- in guiding and providing for the Patriarchs
- in guiding his people out of through the desert and into the promised land
by giving them peace and prosperity in their own land and later on freeing them from exile and leading them back to the
land of their ancestors
In all these events, God invited them to love him in return, an invitation that often remained unanswered
Old Testament- God’s covenant with Israel
New Testament- God’s Covenant with us in Christ
II. Man and Woman: The Original Image
A. God’s First-Born Son
God, we’re told, "created man in His image…in the divine image…male and female" (eeGenesis 1:26-28).
What does it mean that God created man in "the divine image"? It means that the human person is a child of God.
Adam is "the son of God" (Luke 3:38). We, see too, elsewhere in Genesis, that the phrase "image and likeness" is used to
describe the birth of Seth, Adam’s son (see Genesis 5:3).
In the language of the Bible, to be born in someone’s "image and likeness," means to be that person’s child. So, when God
creates man in His image, He creates Him to be His son.
From the very beginning, then, we see that God intended people to be His children, His divine offspring.
B. Father of a Priestly People
Adam is created as God’s first-born son. He’s also conceived as a priest.
Adam is placed in the Garden "to cultivate and care for it" (see Genesis 2:15). Something important gets lost in the
translation of those words.
In the original Hebrew text, the words used are ‘abodah and shamar. And they are words associated with priestly service.
In fact, the only other places in the Bible where you find those two words used together are in the Book of Numbers,
where they are translated as "service," and "charge," and used to describe the duties of the Levites, the appointed priests of
Israel (see Numbers 3:7-8; 8:26;18:5-6).
The Levites were in charge of protecting the sanctuary and the altar. And Adam was given the duty of protecting, of
caring for, the Garden. All this will become very important when we study Adam’s disobedience and fall from grace.
The Levites were in charge of protecting the sanctuary and the altar. And Adam was given the duty of protecting, of
caring for, the Garden. All this will become very important when we study Adam’s disobedience and fall from grace.
When Jesus comes, He will be called the Son of God and the "new Adam" and the "first-born of many brethren" and the
High Priest. The Church will be referred to as a priestly people.
III. Falling Down
A. Figures and Riddles
The Catechism of the Catholic Church gives us some good advice here:
"The account of the fall in Genesis 3 uses figurative language, but affirms a primeval event, a deed that took place at the
beginning of the history of man. Revelation gives us the certainty of faith that the whole of human history is marked by
the original fault freely committed by our first parents" (see no. 390).
the story "affirms" an actual event that indeed "took place" at the beginning of human history. What’s more, that event,
"the original fault" of Adam and Eve, forever "marked" human history.
B. That Snake Adam Saw
The Hebrew word used to describe the "serpent," nahash, implies something much more deadly.
Throughout the Old Testament nahash is used to refer to powerful, even gigantic, evil creatures. Isaiah calls the nahash a
sea dragon, the great Leviathan (see Isaiah 27:1). Job also uses nahash to depict terrible sea monsters (see Job 26:13).
This is clearly the image the Book of Revelation has in mind when it describes "a huge red dragon" in the heavens, "the
huge dragon, the ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, who deceived the whole world" (see Revelation
12:3,9).
The Church, of course, has always interpreted the serpent in Genesis 3 as Satan, the Devil in slithering form (see
Catechism, nos. 391-395). So we know, as readers, something that Adam probably didn’t know - that this encounter with
the serpent was a test against evil, a battle for the soul of mankind.
But we need to see what Adam saw. Once we appreciate that the serpent was a lot more than a little garden-variety snake,
we begin to understand why Adam failed in his duties to "guard" his wife and Eden (see Genesis 2:15).
C. Scared Unto Death?
To put it bluntly: Adam was scared to death, scared of dying. He saw the serpent as a threat to his life. Because God
warned him that he if he ate the fruit he would die (see Genesis 2:17). If Adam didn’t know what death was, God’s
warning wouldn’t have made any sense.
Adam was scared that if he didn’t do what the serpent wanted he would be made to suffer and die.
This story, this understanding of Adam’s failure, may be behind a passage we find in the Letter to the Hebrews. It says the
Devil has "the power of death" and says also that "through fear of death," the human race had been held "subject to
slavery" (see Hebrews 2:14-15). That doesn’t mean Adam didn’t have any moral choice or responsibility in the matter.
He chose to save his life, but wound up losing it. He feared dying more than he feared disobeying the Father who loved
him and gave him paradise. And in this he plunged the whole human race into slavery.
D. Left Holding the Fruit
Why are we talking about Adam? Why is it his fault? Isn’t the whole story about Eve?
After all, the serpent first addresses "the woman." In fact, the phrase, "the woman" is used four times in six verses and the
man doesn’t come into play until the very end, when it’s mentioned that "her husband" was also "with her."
Clearly, it would seem, Genesis wants us to know that it’s the woman’s fault: She did all the work, negotiating with the
snake, weighing the pros and cons, and finally taking the fruit. The man just ate the fruit the woman gave to him.
Adam was with her all along (see Genesis 3:6).
In fact, in the Hebrew, every time the serpent says the word "you" he’s speaking in a tense that we don’t have in English -
something like "second-person-plural." He’s saying, in effect, "you guys" or "y’all."
So Adam was on the scene the whole time. Why didn’t he speak up, why didn’t he take up the serpent’s challenge?
That seems to be the point. In his fear for his own skin, Adam left his wife hanging, left her to fend for herself. He was
"her husband," the text emphasizes. Husbands are supposed to stand up for their wives - even lay down their lives for
them. That’s what marital love is (seeEphesians 5:25).
IV. A Test of Love - Failed
A. Sacrifice and Selfishness
God gave Adam the responsibility of guarding the garden sanctuary, the dwelling place of God and man.
In the confrontation with the serpent, he failed in his duties. He didn’t protect the garden or his wife or himself.
Adam failed a test of his love - not only of his love for Eve, but his love for God.
Why did God test him like this? Because covenant love requires total self-giving. Self-sacrifice is essential to fulfilling the
obligations of the human relationship with God. A covenant means that God "gives Himself" to His people and the
people, in turn vow to "give themselves" to God.
In the Scriptures, each of the covenants requires the people to make a symbolic offering of themselves to God.
There is no covenant without sacrifice. The sacrifice is offered by the people to symbolize their offering of "themselves"
to God. The sacrifice is a kind of token of their commitment to the covenant, their commitment to give all that they have
and all that they are to God.
Noah makes a sacrifice from each of the animals he took with him in the ark. Abraham is asked to sacrifice his only son,
Isaac. The Israelites in the time of Moses are required to sacrifice an unblemished lamb in the place of their firstborn. And
in the time of David’s son Solomon, sacrifices were offered daily in the Temple.
Each of the covenants foundered and was only partially successful. Why? Because of a failure of love, a failure of
sacrifice. The people refused to give themselves completely.
Noah, Abraham and the rest all did great things. But they also did dumb and terribly wrong things: Abraham took a
concubine. Noah became drunk. Moses lost his temper in the desert. Israel worshipped the golden calf. David committed
adultery with Bathsheba. His son, Solomon, built a harem in addition to building the Temple.
We see in Adam’s failure the beginning of this pattern. In fact, because the human race was so weakened by Adam’s
original sin that no one could give himself completely to God. And because of Adam’s sin, humanity lost its birthright -
its divine inheritance, its membership in God’s family.
B. Death Threats
But before we move from Adam to Jesus, let’s look at the riddle of the story. God tells Adam and Eve not to eat of the
Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. "The moment you eat from it you are surely doomed to die," he warns
(see Genesis 2:17).
The serpent directly contradicts God. He tells Adam and Eve: "You certainly will not die" (see Genesis 3:4). He says, too
that they will be like "gods who know what is good and bad" (see Genesis 3:5).
And it’s true that when they eat the fruit, they don’t keel over and die. Instead, their eyes are opened just like the serpent
said they would be (see Genesis 3:7). Even God has to admit, "See! The man has become like one of us, knowing good
and evil" (see Genesis 3:22).
Is the serpent right? Was God lying to the two? It certainly looks that way on the surface.
But of course it isn’t that way.
Adam and Eve do die the moment they eat the fruit - spiritually. The truth in Satan’s lie was this: Adam and Eve would
not die a physical death once they ate the fruit. Adam and Eve lost something greater than natural life when they sinned;
they lost supernatural life, the life of grace in their souls.
Seduced into trying to be like God without God, they died the death. Yes, they chose the fruit freely, like God they
exercised free will. But their freedom only led them into slavery. Their eyes were indeed opened, and they discovered
their nakedness and were ashamed.
We know that Satan has "the power of death" (see Hebrews 2:14-15). Adam and Eve should have listened to God, whose
warning seems to echo in these words of Jesus: "And do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul;
rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both body and soul in Gehenna" (see Matthew 10:28).
V. The Second Coming of Adam and Eve
But even as His children have exiled themselves from paradise through sin, God promises them redemption, a
homecoming.
He promises that throughout human history there will be an "enmity" between the serpent, Satan, and the woman, "the
mother of all the living," and between their offspring (see Genesis 3:15, 20).
The early Fathers of the Church called this the "First Gospel" (Proto-Evangelium).
God was promising, here in the first pages of the Bible, a new Adam and a new Eve, to undo the damage done by the first
couple.
St. Paul called Jesus the "last Adam" or the New Adam (see 1 Corinthians 15:21-22, 45-49; Romans 5:14). And the
tradition of the Church has always seen Mary as the "new Eve" (see Catechism, nos. 410-411). ;
As Adam called Eve "woman," we see Jesus call Mary "woman" (compare Genesis 2:23and John 2:4).
As Eve disregarded God’s commands, Mary offers herself freely to the will of God and says "Do whatever He tells you"
(see Luke 1:38; John 2:5).
Finally, as Eve was the "mother of all the living," Mary is given by Jesus to be mother of the people of God
(compare Genesis 3:20 and John 19:26 and Revelation 12:17).
Jesus enters the world as the new Adam - the One who does what Adam was supposed to do.
He comes, not to do His own will, but the will of the Father who sent Him. He comes to serve and to offer His life as a
ransom for many (see Mark 10:45; John 15:13).
Jesus enters a garden and experiences the curses of Adam - the dread of death, falling to the dirt, sweating blood from his
face in His agony (compare Genesis 3:17-19 and Matthew 26:36-46; Luke 22:44).
He is crowned in thorns and stripped naked (see Matthew 27:29, 31). And He is led to a "tree," the Cross - which the early
Church saw as a symbol of the Tree of Life in the Garden (see Acts 5:30; Galatians 3:13; 1 Peter 2:24).
He does not grasp at "equality with God" as Adam did (see Philippians 2:5-11), but lays down His own life in sacrifice for
the sake of the "garden" - the world, for His bride, the Church.
Adam’s bride Eve was created from his side while he slept. The Church, the bride of Christ, was born from His side,
which was opened by the soldier’s lance while he slept in death on the cross. His side issued forth blood and water,
symbols of baptism and the Eucharist (seeGenesis 2:21-22; John 19:34; Catechism, nos.766; 1067).
Finally, the resurrected Jesus appears in a garden ("in the place where he had been crucified") to a "woman" and is
mistaken as a "gardener" - perhaps a reference to Adam’s task to be keeper of the garden of paradise (see John
19:41; 20:14-18).
All this God promises in the "first gospel."
